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Friday, 26 March 2010

George Dunning "The Flying Man" (1962)

The Flying Man is a movie one is told everyone should see. An experimental film, it won Grand Prize award at Annecy in 1962. The Canadian director, George Dunning, is remembered as the man in overall charge of The Beatles’ psychedelic explosion of 1968, Yellow Submarine. (Also the only man so involved to wear a suit throughout.) Painted with the palest of pastel a man arrives on screen, divests himself of his clothing and flies, though swimming in the air would be a better description. A further man enters with dog. Dog attacks discarded clothes. Flying man descends. Dresses. Leaves. Dog owner fails to fly. Leaves. Man kicks dog. The images are delineated in the most lean fashion though I have to say their bare simplicity has a charm, as do the flickering, disappearing dabs of colour. Ron Goodwin’s music also is perfectly fine but summarily dispensed with in the middle section. As I say, one of the must see films and I’ve seen it.